MEPs vote to tighten anti-tobacco laws, target young smokers

European MPs have voted to dramatically tighten tobacco laws across the union and have focused much of the legislation on trying to put young people off smoking. But the new measures do not go as far as anti-smoking campaigners had hoped for.

MPs have voted in favor of a ban on menthol cigarettes, although
the law won’t come into force for another five years and there
will be more negotiations with EU governments before the law is
adopted in member states.

Other measures to deter people, particularly the young, from
smoking, include putting health warnings on 65 percent of each
side of cigarette packs (though not 75%, as originally proposed).
Currently health warnings must cover 30 percent of one side of a
pack of cigarettes and 40 percent of the other.

There will also be ban on the words appearing on cigarette packs
such as “low tar”, “mild” and “light”. The new laws will also
apply to roll-your-own tobacco.

Chewing tobacco will also be banned, with the exception of in
Sweden, where it is called snus and is relatively popular.

The proposed legislation will also allow member states to
introduce plain cigarette packaging if they think the need is
justified.

However, lawmakers rejected a proposal by the European Commission
to force electronic cigarettes to be sold as medical products,
which would have restricted sales. They also did not ban slim
cigarettes – smoked by some, particularly women, with the idea
that they help with weight loss and are associated with looking
attractive.

Amanda Sandford from the smoking and health campaign group Action
on Smoking and Health (ASH), while welcoming the laws, said she
would like to have seen them go further.

“We would like to have seen MEPs vote to increase health
warnings to 75%,” Sandford told RT. “We’d also like to see
e-cigarettes regulated under medical legislation. While
e-cigarettes are considerably less hazardous than tobacco
products, because they’re not properly regulated at the moment,
we can’t be sure they’re entirely safe.”

The vote was preceded by intense lobbying from the tobacco
industry and health campaigners on European MPs. Nearly 700,000
Europeans die from smoking-related illnesses each year, with an
estimated healthcare cost across the EU of 25.3 billion euros
($33.4 billion) annually. Meanwhile, in the UK alone the sale of
tobacco products generated £9 billion ($14.6 billion) last year,
amounting to 2% of all tax revenue.

There will now be further negotiations between EU health
ministers, which may mean MEPs will be able to avoid a second
vote and fast-track the legislation to become law before the May
2014 European elections.

E-cigarettes and kiddy packs

Britain has already said that e-cigarettes will have to be
licensed as a medical product from 2016. E-cigarettes replicate
the action of smoking without using tobacco and instead turn
nicotine and other chemicals into vapor.

While sales of e-cigarettes have boomed since smoking was banned
in public places in the EU over six years ago, campaigners say
their growing popularity is dangerous. They say they
could encourage non-smokers and children to start the habit and
undermine years of anti-smoking campaigns.

The European Commission also stated that cigarette packs must be
big enough to make sure that the new larger warnings are fully
visible. They recommended that manufactures must produce a
minimum of 20 cigarettes per pack. However in the UK and Italy 10
is the minimum size.

Their recommendation will doubtless please health campaigners in
the UK, who are calling for a ban on so-called 'kiddy packs' of
10 because they can be brought with pocket money.

Sandford also said that standardizing packs to 20 may encourage
some people to give up smoking.

“Having a minimum pack size may help smokers who are trying to
quit, particularly poorer smokers, because having to pay out for
a pack of 20 cigarettes may make them think twice about the need
to smoke,” she said.

An estimated 4 percent of children in England between the ages of
11 and 15 years old are believed to be smoking at least once a
week.

But a lobby group called the Freedom Organization for the Right
to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco (FOREST) argues that around 2 million
people in the UK buy their cigarettes in packs of 10 because that
is all they can afford, or are trying to cut down, and there is
no evidence that forcing people to buy a pack of 20 will reduce
smoking. The FOREST campaign is funded by the tobacco industry.